


FL/IF Flawless: Under 10X Examination, Stone Is Not Included

by Sand3



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-21
Updated: 2019-10-21
Packaged: 2020-12-27 06:54:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21114578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sand3/pseuds/Sand3
Summary: *****Spoiler warning through S.U. Movie*****Yellow Diamond’s attention and fingers went back to the screens of her console. Spinel was forgotten. Disregarded. Unneeded. She bit down on her tongue, staying rooted, unable to move. Bad things were bubbling up inside of her. Bad things that made her want to be bad. She wanted to scream. She wanted to break things. She wanted to make Yellow Diamond pay attention. But that would make her a bad girl, and Yellow Diamond would probably be mad at her. If she made the Diamonds mad, they might send her away. They might make her go back to the garden. Alone.





	FL/IF Flawless: Under 10X Examination, Stone Is Not Included

**Author's Note:**

> **Warnings:**  
\- traumatized mental state depicted

“Come, come, come and play games with me, down at the old dragée druse!” Spinel sang, weaving her way around around Yellow Diamond’s ankles and hopped over her feet. “Come, come, sing some fun songs with me, down at the old dragée druse!” She reached up, grabbing onto the corner of the enormous seat overhead, and swung her way up to the armrest, then skipped across Yellow Diamond’s knees. “Hear the Carnelian band!” She lighted on the opposite armrest just long enough to prepare a leap up to Yellow Diamond’s shoulder. “Just hold me in your hand, deeeear--”

“Spinel, trinket, I’m very busy right now,” Yellow Diamond cut in, plucking Spinel off her shoulder and setting her back on the floor, gently patting her head. “Why don’t you go play for Blue a while?”

Spinel froze in the spot she had been put down, staring up as Yellow Diamond’s attention and fingers went back to the screens of her console. Her song interrupted, her self moved to the side, out of the way, Spinel was immediately forgotten. Disregarded. Unneeded. She bit down on her tongue, staying rooted, unable to move. Bad things were bubbling up inside of her. Bad things that made her want to be bad. She wanted to scream. She wanted to break things. She wanted to make Yellow Diamond pay attention.

Spinel was pretty sure she could break Yellow Diamond’s work station, but that would make her a bad girl, and Yellow Diamond would be mad at her. A voice in the back of her mind was saying that Yellow Diamond being mad at her was better than ignoring her. But that voice was wrong. Because if she made the Diamonds mad, they might send her away. They might make her go back to the garden. Alone. So she stopped biting her tongue and spread her mouth out into a big big smile and nodded. Yellow Diamond wasn’t looking though, maybe she didn’t even realize that Spinel hadn’t left yet. Spinel spun on one heel and marched to the door, squeaking her way cheerfully out of the room.

The door closed behind her, Spinel heard it latch, then her knees buckled and she ragdolled onto the floor. She clenched her teeth as hard as she could and squeezed her eyes shut. “_Nnnggghh-hk!_” She balled her fists up and pressed them against her face. “_Nnnng-hk-nnngh!_” She told herself to get up and go find Blue Diamond, like Yellow Diamond had said. Herself shot back at her that Blue Diamond was probably too busy too, probably didn’t want to be _annoyed_ either. Everybody was probably tired of her. “_Hk-nnnggghh!_” And she couldn’t get up anyway. She was shaking too much and her legs were refusing to work. Every hiccup made her whole body convulse from her toes to her pigtails.

Maybe it didn’t matter if she was a good girl or a bad girl, maybe they’d make her leave Homeworld just because they were tired of her. Like Yellow Diamond made her leave the control room. But maybe they’d let her stay if she was very very quiet. Spinel curled herself up smaller, bringing her knees to her forehead as she failed to stop the sobs from coming out. She was glad she wasn’t in the control room now, wasn’t annoying Yellow Diamond. She hoped the door wouldn’t open and nobody else would come down the hall. They’d just be annoyed. They’d want her to stop because she was being bad. She wanted herself to stop. But the sobs and tears kept coming out.

She didn’t know how long it went on before the well inside her ran dry and she was too tired to shake. Spinel stayed still and quiet and small for a while longer. She couldn’t hear anybody coming, so nobody would catch her being a bad, ungrateful girl. Finally the aching weakness in her knees started to fade, and Spinel stiffly sat up, scrubbing her hands across her cheeks as she took another minute to brace herself, then climbed to her feet. She sniffled, sweeping her knuckles across her eyes one more time and then bit her lip, looking up the hall. Should she go find Blue or White Diamond? But if they were too busy too, could she take another brushoff gracefully, or would she definitely be bad and make them angry? Was it too big a risk?

Her teeth dug into her lip a little bit harder and she turned her head left, looking down the hall. Her memory might be six thousand years out of date, but most of the rooms she’d been in since the Diamonds brought her home were in the same place she remembered them. There was a room she hadn’t gone to, at the end of a hall she hadn’t walked down, in a wing of the palace she’d stayed out of. She didn’t want to go there; nothing was scarier than the room at the end of that hall. And she needed to go there so much it hurt.

She took a squeaking step; her knees felt stiff and weak. Then she took another; her feet were as hard to lift as when they’d been wrapped in roots and lichen that day, the last day, in the Garden. But she took another. And another. By the time Spinel reached the end of the pale amber hallway, she’d managed to forge a regular tempo, and the beat gave her something to hum along to, and built a momentum that was easy to maintain.

Until, seventeen hallways and a sky-bridge later, she stopped in front of a pink, marble door. Spinel’s knees buckled, putting her on the floor again, but she didn’t go all the way down this time, able to keep herself sitting up. She hiccupped as she stared at the door, and a tiny whimper squeezed out of her throat. She hugged her arms around her chest and went still for a while. But the hiccups stopped after just two, and the sobs didn’t come back, so she swallowed and forced herself to get back up on her feet. She walked slowly to the door and pried it open, then froze, clenching her teeth.

Somebody was inside. Sitting on the floor, right in the middle of the room, legs neatly folded underneath her, hand daintily clasped utop her knees. That somebody turned her head to look at Spinel, who almost took a step backward, unnerved by the monocular gaze. They stared at each other for a minute.

Spinel finally broke the silence, asking the most obvious and pertinent question. “Who are you?” she demanded.

“I’m Pink Diamond’s Pearl,” the somebody answered.

Spinel frowned, and felt anger sparking inside her. “No you’re _not_,” she retorted. She _knew_ Pink Diamond’s Pearl. She’d met her. Six thousand years ago and again six days ago. _This_ was an entirely different Pearl.

The strange Pearl’s brow pinched and an expression of pain overtook her face as her shoulders slumped and her head lowered a bit. “... I was,” she said in a softer voice, so hollow it almost seemed to echo.

Spinel swallowed, continuing to stare at the strange Pearl as she stayed still for another minute or two, before some part of her came to a decision and she came unstuck, stepping into the room and pulling the door shut behind her. She walked slowly over to the middle of the room and sat down, knees almost touching the strange Pearl’s. Spinel wanted to ask why her face was cracked, but that would be rude. And a rude girl was a bad girl.

“Why are you here?” she asked instead.

The Pearl bit her lip for a moment, looking down at her hands. “... Steven said I could stay,” she said.

“He didn’t take you to Earth with him?” Spinel asked, another spark of anger starting to smolder threateningly down in her core.

“He said I could go there too,” the Pearl replied, shaking her head a tiny bit. “He said I could choose… And he said I could choose again later, if I didn’t feel good about the first choice… I think he wanted me to go there, but he said that I didn’t have to… And… This is home.” Her mouth turned into a tiny frown again, her brow pinching.

The anger eased a little, and Spinel looked down at her knees as it gave way to anxious confusion. “B-But… Why are you staying in _here?_ Why are you all alone?”

The Pearl shook her head. “The Pebbles are here too. They just… They don’t really come out… They’re happy with each other… And they’re not much for conversation anyway.”

Spinel bit her lip for a moment. “So… then… why not go out there and hang out with the other Pearls or something?” she asked.

The Pearl’s shoulders drew in and up a bit and her head turned away slightly. “... White Diamond is out there,” she whispered.

Spinel frowned, clenching her teeth and looking down again, squirming a little on the outside as she felt her insides squirm too. For the past six days, the Diamonds had alternated between cuddling her, or watching her play, or distractedly tolerating her while they worked so long as she wasn’t too loud. Six thousand years ago, they’d mostly ignored her. Apart from a few incidents where Blue Diamond or Yellow Diamond had plucked her up out of some kind of splattery mess or other and pushed her into Pink’s arms while scolding Pink for ‘inciting chaos’.

The bigger Diamonds had never made Spinel feel afraid, but she knew that other gems seemed to be afraid of them sometimes. And she remembered how often Pink came stomping back into her room or the Garden, crying and calling the other Diamonds names. Even Steven had said they were difficult to get along with, and Steven tolerated everyone.

“B-But if you stay in here, you’ll be all alone and have nobody to play with,” Spinel pointed out, feeling faint and scared and angry at the very idea. “Because Steven’s not c-coming back. He doesn’t like it here… And- And...” She trailed off.

The Pearl looked at Spinel, eye lighting on her gem then moving up to her face. “... Who are you?” she asked.

“Spinel. I was Pink’s b-best friend,” Spinel answered.

The Pearl’s eye widened slightly and she sucked in her lip. A peculiar shadow crossed her face as she turned it quickly away from Spinel. “Oh.”

Spinel looked down at her knees again and squeezing her hands into fists as a knot squeezed at her throat. “That’s what I was _supposed_ to be,” she said in a much smaller voice. “... That’s what I was made to be.” She blinked quickly and then just squeezed her eyes shut when that didn’t help. “I was flawless, and I had perfect clarity, and- and I was such a g-good girl.” She hiccupped and scrubbed at her cheeks. “I d-did everything she s-_said!_ I did everything I th-thought she w-_wanted!_ Why did she st-stop wanting me? Why d-did she st-stop l-l-_loving_ m-me? W-W-What d-did I d-do _wrong?!_”

Arms wrapped around Spinel and she found herself being pulled up against the Pearl’s chest and held tight there. “Shhhh. Shhhh,” the Pearl hushed, cossetting her hair.

“Sh-She’s n-never coming b-back. She’s never g-going to t-tell me w-what I d-did wr-wrong. W-Why d-did she l-leave m-me all al-lone?” Spinel whined. “W-What’s _wr-wrong_ w-with m-me?”

“Shhhh.” The Pearl kissed her head and rocked her gently. “Your cut is perfect and nobody in the whole galaxy sparkles exactly like you, little jewel,” she murmured.

Spinel broke down into sobs and hiccups, and she clung to the Pearl because she was afraid she might shake right away if she let go. The Pearl kept rocking her, and she didn’t get annoyed, and she didn’t get too busy, and she didn’t make Spinel leave, and she didn’t let go. She sang softly while Spinel cried for a long, long time.

**Author's Note:**

> The title is the definition for 'perfect' gemstones. 'Inclusions' are mineral imperfections that cause them to be speckled or cloudy.
> 
> Spinel's song in the beginning goes to the tune of Florrie Forde's _Down At the Old Bull and Bush_, because I wanted to play around with ragtime for her. Obscure words I used in it:  
dragée: a sugar-coating over nuts, candy or pills  
druse: a crystal-coating over rocks  
carnelian: a stone crystology associates with performance artists
> 
> Where Pink Diamond seemed to view Spinel as being a toy, I got the impression from the _Let Us Adore You_ reprise that the other three were seeing her as more of a pet. Which is a step up at least? The main problem I see being that the Diamonds don't strike me as the kind of people who have the time/energy for an extremely energetic pet, and I feel like realistically, this is going to turn into "kitty get off my keyboard" situation a lot.


End file.
